


The Leaves that Die Tonight

by rachel4revenge (orphan_account)



Series: The One Where Sherlock is a Fawn [3]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Fawnlock, Kidfic, M/M, Mpreg, fairly detailed descriptions of a deer giving birth, twisty magical genderfuckery
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-05-17
Updated: 2013-05-17
Packaged: 2017-12-12 03:53:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/806899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/rachel4revenge
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It occurred to him one day, as he poked half-heartedly in his bare garden, that perhaps Sherlock had grown bored. Maybe the novelty had worn off and he’d returned to his own people. "Our kind loves and mates for life," Mycroft had said. But John wasn’t “their kind,” was he?</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Leaves that Die Tonight

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bennyslegs](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bennyslegs/gifts).



> “I know his heart has beat to bright  
> Sweet loves gone by;  
> I know the leaves that die to-night  
> Once budded to the sky;  
> And I shall die from his delight.” – In Autumn, Alice Meynell

In the fall, Sherlock disappeared without a word. John tried not to worry. In many ways, the fawn was still a wild animal, accustomed to getting caught up in some exploration or experiment and not coming back for days on end. But days on end became weeks on end, and soon the late summer wind grew bitterly cold as the leaves left the trees in great jewel-bright swathes, and John began to grow lonesome.

He started taking long walks in the woods, not-so-inconspicuously keeping an eye out for Sherlock, but the forest around his house was deserted. Not so much as a flicker of a sneeze showed its face. John tried not to miss him so fiercely, but it was difficult. He’d grown used to Sherlock’s eager curiosity at every turn, the constant shadow of his presence, and to suddenly be without it was… not good.

It occurred to him one day, as he poked half-heartedly in his bare garden, that perhaps Sherlock had grown bored. The fawn had the attention span of a three-year-old some days, and he’d known John for almost a year now – had lived with him in his little cottage for over six months. Maybe Sherlock was tired of it. Maybe the novelty had worn off and he’d returned to his own people. _Our kind loves and mates for life_ , Mycroft had said. But John wasn’t “their kind,” was he?

One day in mid-November – a particularly beautiful one, with the last of the autumn leaves splashing like little flames in the brilliant blue sky – John went for a walk. Not in the woods, though it was tempting on a sun-glazed day like this. Instead he headed down the rough dirt track that served as his driveway, hands in his pockets and his heart heavy. It had been two and a half months since he’d last seen Sherlock, and he was trying to resign himself to the fact that the fawn was gone for good.

He was halfway to the road when he heard the crunch of tires of gravel. He lifted his head, startled out of his funk by the totally incongruous sound, in time to see a battered blue police cruiser come around the corner in puffs of miasmic dust. He stepped out of the way just in time. It screeched to a dusty halt on the side of the dirt track, and a graying man poked his head out the window.

“Hullo, mate. Greg Lestrade, police chief.”

“Um.” John stared, at a loss. He hadn’t spoken to another human being in over a month, excluding the grocer and, once, the postman. “Hi. John Watson. Can I… help you?”

“Not particularly,” Lestrade replied easily, “unless you know where Sherlock is.”

John felt every muscle freeze with warning. “I… sorry?”

“Isn’t that his name? Ilissi said something to that effect. Or – oh, it’s Mycroft now, isn’t it. I haven’t learned the latest human names yet.”

“You know Mycroft?” John blurted. Of all the rest, it seemed the most incredible.

“Oh, yeah. We go back. Similar roles, you know. The town’s my jurisdiction, the forest is his.”

Oh. Right. “I… haven’t seen Sherlock. In a longtime.” He swallowed. The pain of it was sharp again in the face of this apparent old acquaintance. At least the police chief looked surprised.

“Really? Ilissi – Mycroft was hoping he was with you. He hasn’t been with the tribe in weeks.”

John’s heart plummeted. “What?”

“Hey,” Lestrade said, alarmed. “You’re white as a ghost. Get in the car, I’ll drive you home, eh?”

“But… Sherlock.” It had never occurred to him, of all the possibilities, that Sherlock might be in trouble. The fawn was invincible in John’s mind, an integral part of the ancient forest. The idea of him being hurt – of the forest turning on him – was impossible. With less than steady knees, he stumbled to the other side of the cruiser and climbed in, letting the smell of cracked leather and old cigarettes permeate his nose. It was completely different from any smell at the cottage or in the surrounding woods, and it helped settle him.

“Nice place you’ve got,” Lestrade said conversationally as they pulled up to the cottage. “Inherited, yeah?”

“From my aunt. She’s in a home, now, insisted it stay in the family.”

“Family’s important,” Lestrade agreed. He climbed out, shut the car door. A few flakes of rust floated down when John did the same.

“Come on in,” he said, hesitant enough that it almost sounded like a question. Lestrade didn’t take offense. He followed John into the cottage, looking around politely as John busied himself with the kettle. “Milk? Sugar?”

“Black,” he said, bouncing a little on the balls of his feet. At John’s jerk of the head, he sat at the kitchen table – in Sherlock’s chair, but John pretended it didn’t bother him – and accepted his cuppa with a nod of thanks. “So, how do you know Sherlock, then?”

John sat opposite him, staring into his cup. He’d made it the way Sherlock liked it – too much sugar, not enough milk. He drank it anyway. “He showed up after I moved in. Well, maybe he’d been around before. Around the cottage, I mean. He can’t have known my aunt personally, though – didn’t know a lick of English, at first.”

“He does that,” Lestrade agreed. “Pokes his nose in without asking.”

“Is that how you know him?”

“Yes. Well, that and Mycroft. Sherlock likes to know everything that happens in the town – squabbles, thefts, the occasional crime – and Mycroft needs to, being who he is.”

“Which is…”

Lestrade blinked. His eyes were a very dark, deep brown, sort of inscrutable. Like Sherlock’s, when he was in a changeling mood. “Like I said, the forest is his jurisdiction. The town, too, technically, but we’ve come to an understanding over the years. They need someone a little more… human to look up to.”

“Like you,” John said. He rubbed the back of his wrist against his prickling nose, and the realization slid neatly into place without prompting. “Someone more human, but not _quite_ human. Am I right?”

Lestrade looked impressed. “You’re quick, for an outsider. Oh, don’t take offense – I only mean, when you’re around this stuff all the time like the locals are, it’s easier to see through. Guess all that time with Sherlock has given you a bit of an edge. Blood too, probably.”

“So they know you’re not human,” John said, deciding it was best not to ask too many questions. “The people in town.”

“Oh, sure. But they’re so used to it, it barely even makes a difference. I’ve been here a while.”

“A while,” John repeated flatly.

“Yep.” Lestrade leaned back, crossed his ankles. “Good tea, this. Almost good as your auld Auntie used to make.”

John could take a hint. And suddenly, with the abrupt rise of fear tightening in his chest, he needed to talk about Sherlock. “If neither of us has seen him, and Mycroft doesn’t know where he is, what do we do?”

Lestrade didn’t so much as blink at the lack of segue. “Have you looked in all his usual places?”

John nodded, a little offended he would ask something so simple. “I’ve done everything. Everything I can think of.”

Lestrade smiled. “So, not quite everything.”

* * *

John felt odd letting a near stranger into his bedroom, but Lestrade had been adamant. The sheets were washed once a week like clockwork, but the thick duvet was subject to a tedious hand-wash only when John could no longer bear the mustiness. Thus, it didn’t take long for them to find four coarse brown hairs, shed by Sherlock in one of his midsummer strops (or, more likely, during a slow, lazy lovemaking session in the cloying August heat).

“One for each point on the compass,” Lestrade explained. “Ones shed in your presence are best.”

“These probably were,” John admitted with a slight blush. “What now?”

“Now, a little old-fashioned magic. You know a bit, I assume.”

“Um. No, I don’t think so.”

“Really? But your aunt…” Lestrade paused and shook his head. “Never mind. C’mon, let’s go outside.”

It seemed darker when they stepped out the door; clouds had gathered quickly, blocking the warm sun from view. John shrugged his jacket higher around his ears and looked to Lestrade.

“This might be a bit weird for you,” the copper said apologetically. “Close your eyes.”

John did, and kept them closed. He didn’t open them again until the spinning stopped.

When John had been set down, he bent over and braced himself on his knees, trying not to thrown up. The ride hadn’t been exactly bumpy, but he’d never done that sort of traveling before. When he’d gotten his breath back, he straightened and looked around. Lestrade hadn’t come with him; he stood alone at the scraggly boundary between scrubby forest underbrush and sunlit meadow. He rubbed his face and turned, chest tight with cautious hope.

And there he was, sprawled on his back in the grass of a broad clearing. Sherlock’s human feet were tucked up, knees bent and splayed wide so that the sunlight fell over his form with liquid artistry. His… altered form. John’s mind rebelled at what he saw, but there was no mistaking it. Instead of a flat belly, the ribs protruding as they should have in his outstretched position, Sherlock’s stomach was lifted in an unmistakable curve. The curve of someone carrying a child.

 “Oh god, Sherlock.”

The fawn’s head shot up immediately. His eyes focused on John, dark and wary in his pale, thin face. Guilty. John’s heart broke a little in his chest.

“Where have you been?”

Sherlock licked heart-shaped lips and unfolded himself from the grassy sward. He moved toward John slowly, graceful in spite of the added girth, and hovered a few feet away. “Why John come?”

John stared. “Because I was worried sick, you git,” he exclaimed. A new kind of sickness slammed into him, suddenly. “Oh. I see.” Sherlock’s closed-off eyes, the fertile swell of his abdomen, told the whole story. He’d been facing this possibility for almost two months, but now the reality was a cold weight on his chest, so heavy he could hardly breathe. “I’ll just leave you alone then. I…” His voice caught, but he pushed through. “I hope you have a happy life, Sherlock. I really do.” He turned around again, suffocating.

A wiry hand snapped out and grabbed at him, nearly toppling him over backward. Sherlock crowded him closely, eyes sharp as silver knives. “Where are you going, John?”

“Home,” John bit out, his jaw clenched unhappily. He wasn’t sure how, as he’d come here entirely by means outside his own power, but he knew he couldn’t stay here any longer.

“John is upset.” Sherlock’s fingers alighted on his face, feeling out the strained contours. “Why?”

“Why?” John repeated, incredulity rising only to be wiped out by the hot flood of anger. “Maybe it’s because you left without a word, without the goodness to even tell me it was over. And when I finally find you, you’re… pregnant, or, or something, clearly belonging to someone else. So yeah, I guess I am upset. Don’t trouble yourself.”

He tried to pull free, but Sherlock’s fingers held him fast. The fawn’s ears flicked back and forth uneasily. “I left – not word. A token.” He swallowed. “Tree branch, in the window.”

“A tree branch,” John echoed flatly. He tried to remember that Sherlock operated under different rules, different guidelines than the human norm, tried to swallow back the bitter taste on his tongue. “I have no idea what that means.”

“It means –” He paused, and John could practically see him flicking through his mental catalogue of words. “Seclusion,” he said at last, eyes sparking with triumph.

“Seclusion.”

“Yes. Alone, in the woods, for a little time. Make sure to be connected to the wild, to the…” Sherlock curled his tongue distastefully at the unsuitable word, “magic.” He patted his stomach. “Baby.”

John sagged, impossible weary. “And whose baby is it, Sherlock?”

Sherlock stared at him as if he were incapable of comprehending the extent of John’s stupidity. “You gave me a baby, John.”

The tight knot in his chest dissolved so quickly if left him feeling weightless. “ _What_?”

Sherlock’s uncertainty smoothed into some indefinable blend of tenderness and smirky satisfaction. He slipped closer, sinuous, and took John’s hands, placing them on the warm swell of his belly. John’s fingers tightened reflexively. “John,” Sherlock repeated, nosing his cheek, “you gave me a baby.”

“Oh my god,” John breathed, and his arms enveloped Sherlock so quickly he couldn’t remember making the decision to do it. “ _How_?”

Sherlock looked nonplussed. “John love Sherlock very much.”

John choked on his own laughter, buried his face in Sherlock’s neck. “You’re right, I do love you. Can you come home, now?”

Sherlock purred, fingertips tracing a sizzling path down John’s back. “Yes.”

John sighed his relief against the fawn’s throat. “Good.”

* * *

Lestrade was smoking a cig when Sherlock and John wandered back to the house. The fawn gave a loud exclamation of disgust upon seeing him and turned right back around, going to sulk in the overgrown orchard.

“That’s unexpected,” Lestrade murmured wickedly, stubbing out his cigarette on his own thumb. John winced, but the cherry-red glow merely puffed out harmlessly without leaving so much as a mark.

“Yeah, no kidding. I don’t even…”

“He’s not human, remember.”

“Could _you_ get pregnant, if you wanted?” John challenged.

The police chief laughed. “Don’t ask questions you don’t want to know the answer to, John. Listen, I have to go report to Mycroft like a good dog. I’m sure we’ll run into one another again.”

He shook John’s unresisting hand with a knowing smile and a “Cheers, mate” that was so incredibly bloke-ish that John almost forgot to turn his head away when a sneeze crept up and caught him unawares. Lestrade’s eyes glittered with amusement as he loped over to his car. When he’d disappeared down the dirt track with copious clouds of dust for company, John meandered around the corner of the house to find Sherlock.

The fawn was laying on his back under one of the trees, eyes closed as he rubbed the velvety twists of his antlers leisurely against the bark. John realized, with some disappointment, that Sherlock would be losing his antlers soon. He settled in the grass next to him and his hands hovered, uncertain, before settling inescapable on Sherlock’s growing stomach.

“I don’t understand this at all,” he admitted. Sherlock’s silver eyes settled on him patiently. “You have a… uterus now? And a vagina?”

“Vagina,” Sherlock agreed, with the comprehension of someone who’d read all the textbooks and knew all the theoretical definitions, if not the practical effects. He reached out to curl his fingers around John’s hand and push it lower. “Feel.”

“Christ,” John sighed. He forced down the almost overwhelming desire born of long nights without his lover’s closeness; the doctor’s persona fell over him like a mantle, and he combed his fingers through the thick, fragrant hair curling at Sherlock’s groin. His knuckles nudged a small, soft prick, though it began to stir at the contact. With a gentle, exploratory touch, he ran his thumb and forefinger down the shaft in a loose grip. It was warm and sweaty, and he realized almost right away that it wasn’t growing nearly as much as it used to do. Sherlock still seemed to be enjoying himself. At the base, John circled his grip. Sherlock’s bollocks had shrunk considerably, becoming little more than two firm glands bulging to either side of his prick. Below, the skin of his perineum had wrinkled into two mounds. When he slid his forefingers inside, he found wet, warm folds and the smooth elasticity of a vagina.

“That,” John said, “is the strangest thing I’ve ever seen.”

Sherlock wriggled a bit, pouting. “You don’t like it?”

“It’ll take some getting used to.” John let his fingers slip-slide a little bit, pressing just a touch deeper. “Do _you_ like it?”

Sherlock was starting to turn pink, on his cheeks and all down his chest. “Feels different,” he mumbled. “Need more data.”

John rolled his eyes. “You’re such a prat.”

The fawn grinned cheekily. “Prat.”

“Yes, we’ve established this.” John curled his fingers, petting carefully at Sherlock’s center. The fawn’s eyelids fluttered. “Listen, Sherlock. We have to talk about this.”

“No talking,” Sherlock insisted. “More fucking.”

John smothered a laugh. “Yeah, that too. But this…” He wiggled his fingers, and Sherlock’s hips jerked reflexively. “And the baby, and you leaving without a word… we need better communication if this is going to work.”

Sherlock’s contented expression curled into a worried frown. “John leave?”

“What? No, of course not.” He paused, but the tight fist in his stomach was still present enough for him to add, “You’re the one who did that.”

“Had to,” Sherlock insisted.

John laid his hand on the curls over Sherlock’s lower belly, where the fertile swell tamped down to the flat plane of his hips. “I know. But it still hurt.”

Sherlock’s face shifted, softening from stubbornness to contemplation and then to understanding. He reached out and touched John’s cheek. “I’m sorry, John.” His brow furrowed unhappily. “I try harder, now.”

John had to smile. “I know you will.” He turned his head to kiss Sherlock’s palm and the fawn brushed the tips of his fingers against John’s cheek.

“Talk after?” he suggested. At John’s slow nod, Sherlock opened his arms and drew John down against him.

His lover with a vagina was… not as different as John had expected. He was still warm and receptive, still greedy for kisses, still eager to put his hands everywhere they could possibly go. If John focused on that, and ignored the slight shift in anatomy, he could almost forget the unusually wet, velvety grip of Sherlock’s body around his prick, or the way he had to lift himself slightly on his elbows to keep from putting too much pressure on Sherlock’s swollen belly.

Even so, he was obviously being too gentle, because the fawn eventually bucked him off and rolled them over in the damp grass, straddling John’s hips and sinking down in one smooth glide. John muffled a shout behind his teeth and closed his eyes against the sight of Sherlock, writhing and growling and sweat-gleaming, his not-so-slim form rocking with natural, joyous ease. The level-headed, practical side of John dissolved, and all he could think of as he came was that _he_ had done this to Sherlock, _he_ was the one who now possessed him in this way, that this living evidence of their union was incontrovertible and inerasable.

Sherlock came, too, though it was more internal than John was accustomed to. His erection, flushed a dark purple-red for all its reduced size, spurted short, thin strands of milky white onto John’s belly, while inside, his muscles clamped down so hard John could have sworn he was about to have a second orgasm.

“Jesus Christ,” he croaked, not fighting as Sherlock wavered and slumped against him. “God, I missed you, Sherlock.”

“Mmf.” Sherlock rubbed his face into the sweaty crook of John’s neck and sighed happily. “Miss you too, John.”

They did talk, after, for a long time on the couch until the sun was behind the horizon and Sherlock was slurring what little English he possessed. John tucked him into their bed and sat up beside him, stroking his wild hair and shedding antlers, and thought for hours about the future.

* * *

Sherlock’s speech improved by leaps and bounds that winter. There was little else for him to do. The snow drifted as high in the roof in some places, and more than once they couldn’t even get out of the front door just to fetch groceries. So they sped through children’s books and medical texts and the occasional lurid novel,  and John read as many childrearing books as he could get his hands on. And all the while Sherlock grew fussier, his words grew longer, and his belly swelled fuller and fuller will the promise of new life.

One day, they woke up to a determined swathe of sunlight pouring through the window and the chuckling of birdsong. Sherlock insisted on going outside, and John, who’d been cooped up with him for several weeks straight, was quick to agree. The fawn waddled out into the watery sunshine and rolled about in a shrinking snow bank while John shoveled a haphazard path to the shed and the greenhouse, both nearly buried under a good four feet of snow.

Back inside that evening, wrapped snugly in front of the fire, John combed the tangles from Sherlock’s hair and asked, “When is the baby coming?”

“You ask too much,” Sherlock mumbled, his low voice a purr of pleasure under John’s ministrations.

“I haven’t asked in over a week.”

“And what do I always say?”

“ _Wait ‘til spring_ ,” John quoted, long-sufferingly patient. “Well, it’s almost spring. I’m ready for a more definitive answer.”

Sherlock turned his head enough to roll one quicksilver eye up at him. “It will come when it’s ready, and not before. But,” he said, before John could work up a strop, “I suspect before the Spring Equinox.”

“Mid-March.” John counted in his head as he worked out a particularly stubborn tangle. “That’s a little over a month. Jesus. We don’t even have a nursery set up.”

Sherlock wrinkled his nose. “What for? There’s a crib in the shed; we can set it up in the bedroom if you want.”

“And blankets? Nappies? Baby formula?”

Sherlock turned over fully to give him a scathing look. “John. Everything she needs, I have.”

“She,” John echoed, going very still. “When did that happen?”

“Today. Morning.” He rubbed his cheek against John’s denim-clad thigh. “She likes the snow, but she’s definitely waiting until there is more grass.”

“Is she going to be born… outside?” John ventured. The thought of birthing his own daughter in the middle of nowhere, with no proper training and the nearest midwife a forty-minute drive away, gave him the willies.

“Of course.” Sherlock looked positively scandalized. His expression shifted, moving to what John privately referred to as his ‘thinking face.’ “Oh. I should probably tell you.”

John tried very hard not to grind his teeth. “Tell me what?”

“The birth will be – as a roe. A deer,” he clarified. “Easier for me, and it makes no difference to her. She’s secure.”

“What form will she take?” John wondered. For some reason this was the first he’d thought of it; he’d assumed she’d be born like a human baby.

Sherlock shrugged, his sharp shoulders digging briefly into John’s ribs. “That is up to her.” He tipped his head back to bare his throat, encouraging John to nuzzle into it. He didn’t resist the blatant offer. “Also…”

“Mmm.” John rubbed his lips against that pale stretch of delicious skin. “Also?”

“The birth will be public.”

“Ah. What?”

“It is a fine thing, a baby,” Sherlock murmured. He sounded almost embarrassed about it. “Something to celebrate. Many fae will be there – not obvious to you, but hiding in the woods, watching. It’s a sort of festival.”

John grimaced at the thought of making something so special and personal a public spectacle. But then, if he couldn’t tell they were there… “Oh, great,” he sighed. “I’m going to be sneezing up a storm.”

Sherlock giggled, and the generous shell of his furred ear tickled the bare, delicate curve of John’s. “It’ll be fine, John.” He patted his hand, and didn’t bother to release it. “Whatever form she takes, when she is born – I will take it also, afterward. It will be some time before she will learn to change her shape.”

“You mean, you might be stuck as a deer for months.” _Thus the unconcern about the nursery_.

“Not _months_ ,” Sherlock scoffed. “Perhaps two, at most.”

“But I can… be with you?” he ventured. “It won’t be like before, will it?”

“When I left, you mean.” Sherlock turned in his arms and snuggled even closed under their blankets. John could feel his smile curving at the base of his throat. “No. It won’t be like that at all.”

* * *

Sherlock’s calculations were only a little bit off. Spring Equinox come and went, spent outside in spite of the chilly weather. Lestrade dropped by now and then, which Sherlock tolerated; he was there at Mycroft’s behest, on paper, but John had come to appreciate the other man’s company. He wasn’t sure what Lestrade _was_ , exactly, but he acted human enough that, most of the time, John could pretend it was the truth. It also had the pleasant side-effect of conditioning him so that his nose no longer protested quite so often or so violently at the presence of magical folk.

On the second day of April, John woke up to the spread of warm wetness along his hip. For one fuzzy, half-asleep second he thought Sherlock had had a wet dream (not the first, although the first since the early days of sharing a bed). But the wetness kept going, climbing stickly to his knee and saturating his sleeping shorts, and he reared awake with a strangled noise. “Sherlock?”

The heavy weight of Sherlock’s body beside him pitched, rolling against him, and there were hands fluttering against his face. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, his breath on John’s face scraping hot and sharp in his sinuses.

“It’s okay. Did your water break?”

The rub of Sherlock’s nose on his cheek was a trembling nod. “Time.”

“It’s time. Okay. God.”

“No, John, _time_ – what time is it, what hour?”

“Oh!” John sat up in the dimness, rubbing his eyes as he peered at the clock. “Four thirty… five. Four thirty-five.” He struggled out of bed and stripped off his sopping shorts, stumbling around to Sherlock’s side of the bed. “Are you all right? Are you in pain?”

“Some.” Under his tentative hands, Sherlock’s body was quivering, and his thighs were slick and sticky with amniotic fluid. The fawn twisted toward him and gave a small grunt of discomfort. “I need to change.”

John was well aware that he wasn’t talking about clothes. “Yes, all right. Let me get dressed and I’ll help you outside.”

He’d had an emergency change of attire waiting for nearly three weeks just under the foot of the bed. He dressed quickly, pulling on pants, thick wool socks, lined denim trousers, and three layers of shirts before returning to Sherlock. He 

was sitting up now, hunched over with his legs dangling off the edge of the mattress. When John touched his arm, he shivered and leaned into the touch.

“The bed…”

“Don’t worry about the bed, I’ll change it later. The mattress will survive.” John slipped an arm around Sherlock’s waist in time to feel another shudder wrack him, tightening the winches of his spine until he was a trembling, heaving mass of limbs and swollen belly in John’s grip. “Easy,” he murmured, although as platitudes went it was painfully useless. He smoothed kisses against Sherlock’s sweaty forehead until the contractions subsided. Then: “Ready?”

Sherlock’s laugh was brittle was residual pain. “ _She’s_ ready, which is all that matters.” He didn’t speak anymore, just let John support him as they moved through the cottage to the front door.

On the little slate patio in the back, little more than a stoop, John reluctantly stepped away from Sherlock’s furnace-like heat. His nose tickled, but he pinched it firmly, eyes watering as he watched Sherlock’s shape blur and lengthen, his gangly lines smooth into something more graceful and practical. He sniffed loudly afterward and blinked the gathered tears away. “My god, you’re lovely.”

Sherlock hadn’t taken on his roe-shape since the summer, and John could definitely see the changes. He was more doe than buck, now, more slim and fragile-looking, his slender head devoid of antlers. The gravid curve of his belly seemed impossibly large, too heavy for his delicate frame. Black liquid eyes turned to him and blinked patiently.

“Yeah. I know, come on. Lead the way, love.” He stepped close and put his hand on the warm fur that overlaid his ribs. Sherlock took a deep breath and puffed it out against John’s cheek before turning and picking his way gingerly to the reaching arms of the forest.

It was dark, but the waning gibbous provided enough light that John could follow Sherlock’s sure steps without falling over. The space they arrived at was a tiny clearing, the tree branches barely parting enough to let in the starlight; John felt the back of his throat crawling with an unrealized sneeze, and he coughed firmly to dispel it. Sherlock turned to look at him over his shoulder, ears flicking. John’s answering smile wobbled a bit.

“All right?”

Sherlock’s head bobbed once, a very deer-like motion in spite of the human intent. John found a bare, frosty spot beneath a tree and settled down to watch.

Sherlock spent a good half-hour just pacing. Occasionally he would stop and stretch out his neck, trembling as his muscles worked and strained of their own accord. John could barely keep his eyes open; several times he yawned so hard his jaw felt like it would snap off, and he got up to stamp his feet and do a little pacing of his own. Now and then Sherlock came back to him, nudging his chest and shoulders with his head. John stroked his neck and let the roe lean against him, counting the seconds between Sherlock’s breaths.

The moon slowly grew dim as the horizon lightened, and as Sherlock made restless paths around the clearing, John saw the bulge beneath his tail was interrupted by something small and dark poking from the vaginal opening. He resisted the urge to get a closer look and waited for Sherlock to come to him. He did, at last, swollen sides heaving as he leaned his body into John’s. John petted trembling hands along Sherlock’s spine and watched in amazement as two tiny hooves were pressed further from his body.

 _Deer form, then_ , he thought to himself, and rubbed Sherlock’s flanks. “You’re doing so well,” he murmured. Sherlock craned his long neck around and breathed wetly on John’s ear for answer.

It was a slow process, and gradually John started to relax. Sherlock paced less and pushed more, frozen in a graceful splay of legs as the light warmed with the advent of morning. John leaned against the tree and folded his arms to keep his hands warm, a little awestruck. More of the legs were emerging – the front legs, he thought, though he was hardly an expert – and Sherlock was in the center of the clearing now, head down and nibbling at grass as if he hadn’t a care in the world. John bit a smile back from his lips and stepped forward to join him, some amorphous intent to stroke the fullness of his stomach hovering in the back of his mind; and suddenly Sherlock made a low, guttural sound and staggered a bit, lowering himself to the knees of his forelegs.

John froze for a moment before quickening his pace. He crouched down, resting one hand on that elegant neck. “Sherlock?”

The roe’s eye rolled over to stare at him, and there was a flicker of silver around the black edges. Sherlock lowered himself completely, legs folded beneath him, and twisted around to sniff beneath his tail. The flesh there bulged dangerously, glistening with fluids; John worried his lower lip. “Is something wrong?”

Sherlock flicked one ear back at him. Then, very slightly, his muzzle dipped in affirmation. John’s stomach clenched. _Fuck_.

“What do you need me to do?”

Sherlock found John’s hand with his nose and pushed it back to where the ambiguous forelegs protruded. John hedged a bit before laying his fingers over the tiny, slender limb. It was warm and still slick, the hair sticking to the skin beneath, and at his touch it jerked a little. Sherlock huffed a hot breath on John’s wrist and John swallowed. Christ, what was he doing? He wasn’t trained in human midwifery, let alone animal.

 _The principles are simple_. John could practically hear Sherlock’s voice in his head. _Thing is in body. Thing has to come out of body. So, get thing out of body_.

Right. Easy enough. With a doctor’s precision, he palpated the area, pink skin stretched tight around the shape beneath. He slid his fingers in just a bit, and startled to feel the smooth, hairless curve of a human cranium. John looked up, meeting Sherlock’s dark, patient eyes, and swallowed. “It’s… the head is a human child’s. But it has deer legs. I don’t understand.”

 _Does it matter? It still needs to come out_.

John did know that, at least. A baby of any kind kept too long in limbo between the life-giving umbilical cord and the open air would not survive. He reckoned the labor had been an hour already. Not terribly long, but Sherlock was obviously in pain and ready for it to be over. John turned back to his task. Would a small incision in the vaginal opening be any help? Or could he help ease the head out on its own?

He pressed two fingers in a little deeper, following the slippery path of the fawn’s forelegs until he could curl the tips around the curve of the head. Whispering half-mumbled apologies, he took the forelegs in a firm grip with his other hand and began to pull slightly with each contraction, trying to hook his fingers around the back of the skull. For the first time, Sherlock made a true sound of distress – a low, rattling groan that echoed eerily among the trees – and John winced. But he kept at it as gently as he could, easing the baby forward with each muscle contraction, until he realized Sherlock needed to start doing some of the work.

“I need you to push now,” he said, and the words had barely gotten out before his hand was being well and truly crushed. John gritted his teeth as his phalanges ground together, entirely out of his control – and then, with a little surge of blood and fluids, he could see the top of the head. “Again,” he croaked, breathless. A small whimper escaped as his fingers were crushed between the vaginal walls and the skull of his daughter. He forced the pain away and watched with bone-weakening relief as Sherlock finally pushed the head out of his body.

Sherlock heaved, and John’s hands slipped free as Sherlock staggered to his feet again, the baby’s forelegs and head dangling a bit ridiculously from his hindquarters. John sat back and massaged his bruised hand, catching his breath as Sherlock lurched forward a few steps and paused, finding his rhythm again.

“Jesus.” He wiped his sweaty face on his sleeve and tried not to imagine all the messy, horrible ways this could go wrong.

But his worst fears began to dissolve as Sherlock grew more and more energetic. The pacing became a fairly reliable near-trot from one side of the clearing to the other, interspersed with bouts of determined pushing. John sat cross-legged in the middle and watched as, bit by bit, their child emerged: little dangling forelegs, a round, pink head tucked close, followed by a human torso curled up and the rest of the deer body. _A centaur_ , his mind supplied, and immediately rebelled at the idea. This delicate, pinkish creature was not horse-like by any stretch of the imagination.

Near the end, Sherlock returned, thrusting his nose against John’s face as his legs trembled and his breath puffed wetly against his cheek. John couldn’t help but hold his own breath as Sherlock’s body gave a final heave, and the fawn-child tumbled gently to the grass.

Almost at once, Sherlock collapsed in an exhausted heap, though his neck still craned eagerly to lick away fluids and gunk from the baby. John crawled on his hands and knees to inspect his daughter. She looked… older than he had expected. Less like a newborn (even if her eyes _were_ scrunched up and her face was smushed a bright red color), and more like a one- or two-month-old, at least proportionally. As Sherlock’s long tongue cleaned her face and she began twitching and whimpering, he could see that her hair was pale yellow-brown, like John’s, but curling in a wild thatch on top of her head like Sherlock’s. She had no umbilical cord, or any mark at all on her stomach. Her deer-limbs were twig-thin and very, very long, splayed around her body like severed marionette strings. John reached out a hand to pet the curlicue fuzz, and her eyes flew open: wide and a vivid slate-blue, with dark blonde lashes and brown freckles clustered thickly around the lids. Her pink mouth opened, but no sound came out.

_Food, you idiot, she needs food!_

Not entirely certain the voice in his head wasn’t actually Sherlock, John tugged the little fawn-child around and positioned her head to get at the sustenance she needed. With a sigh, he laid down in the grass at her side, one hand flung out to rest on Sherlock’s foreleg as the roe continued licking her clean with long rasps of his tongue.

“Can you even take this shape?” he croaked. “I’ve never seen you do it before.”

Sherlock left off the bathing to shake his head and nose at his own side briefly.

“So you’ll keep this one. Makes sense.” John yawned. “Why am I so sleepy? I hardly did any of the work.”

Sherlock just gave him an amused look and closed his eyes briefly. Taking the hint, John sat upright again and shrugged out of his outer shirt – an old, ragged jumper that had seen better days – and started rubbing down the deer-limbs and torso of their newborn.

Sherlock had spoken the truth – John had seen neither hide nor hair of any fae folk from beginning to end. But he felt a definite lack of presence as they lay in the warm sunshine, and knew they were alone again. When Sherlock was rested enough, John gathered their fawn-child in his arms, her long legs kicking a bit as they dangled, and walked with them back to the house. He felt sort of in limbo; weariness still tugged at him, making everything soft and warm around the edges, as if it were all a dream. But the sweet pink cheek of his daughter against his neck and her little hands clutching at his collar were definitely no dream.

They’d picked a name out, when Sherlock had finally discovered the sex, but John hesitated to use it yet. It wasn’t a human name, so his pronunciation was terrible; he was afraid that she would learn to answer to his butchered syllables, and not the beautiful way it was _supposed_ to be said.

“Mhera,” Sherlock had said, laying against John’s chest one evening in bed.

John had jerked awake from a half-sleep and mumbled, “Mra? What?”

“Mhera,” Sherlock had repeated. “It means snow-flower. That’s what her name will be.”

“I can’t even say that. Meera?”

“Close enough,” Sherlock had mumbled, and promptly fallen asleep.

So Mhera it was, even though John could barely say it. He whispered it in her hair as he bore her inside, holding open the door for Sherlock with his foot. Sherlock went straight to the couch, where he could curl up comfortably at one end even in roe-shape. John sprawled at the other end, one leg crooked against the back and the other dangling on the floor. Mhera was situated on his chest, her hooves tucked daintily under her and her thumb already in her mouth. Within the space of a few minutes, the little family of three was fast asleep.

**Author's Note:**

> The extent of my knowledge of deer birthing procedure is limited to one (very educational) youtube video and a brief skim of Wikipedia. Anything out of the ordinary is artistic license.


End file.
